Second Best Honus Wagner Portrait Card
 

The T206 Wagner is the King of all Cards. It contains the Horner Portrait Photo of Wagner in his baseball uniform.

There are 10 different Horner Wagner-Uniform portrait cards, listed and pictured below.

T206
W600 Types III & IV
D322 Tip Top
E90-2
E104-2
E103
M116 Blue
M116 Pastel
Colgan's
WUNC (not mine)

If you could only have one of these cards for your collection, which would you choose and why?

Personally, I choose the D322 Tip Top because (i) its a an almost exact resemblance to the T206, especially with "Pittsburgh" on the chest, (ii) his/its portrait is facing left like the T206, (iii) its orange background reminds me of the T206, and (iv) its very rare with less than 70 graded.

As an aside, there are 3 other Wagner "portrait cards": The W600 Type I & II, the E107, and the 1914 Cracker Jack. But I did not include these because I wanted to keep the discussion to the proxies for the T206.

Here is what the E254 Colgan's Chips Honus Wagner looks like, just for completeness sakes.

Brian (not mine, but I voted for it, because it would likely be the least expensive. Not to mention that he is looking the 'right' way)

D322 for me. Then followed by either M116 version. Can't go wrong with any really.

All are amazing and could be 1st pick for different reasons. Like my steak, I would select the W-UNC since I love what’s rare. It has fewer than 10 total graded copies and has the same orientation as the original photo. Some don’t prefer strip or hand cut cards, but that’s a way they were made in the teens (and twenties), so a legit part of baseball card history.

I would choose the W600 because of its awesome size and beauty, though it’s really close because the tip top are such cool cards and i love the size and image on those. (I own neither). Cant go wrong between those two.

I like the blue, the pastel, and the E103 equally, and lament not buying an E103.

The W600 may not be the popular pick but I love the look and it is an early Wagner and I like the uniform version although most of us would be glad to have either

I like his W600 best. I think it has the most accurate image of Hans when compared to the others.

My votes as follows:

1) Tip Top bread- reminds me of the t206. Unbelievably cool card
2) M116 Sporting Life- the pastel is so clean
3) E90-2 - love the blue

My vote is for his E90-2 American Caramel.

His head looks too small compared to the rest of his body on his D322.

I agree with Tony because the W600 has a photo image, which makes it the most accurate image of Wags.

Tip top…its a jumbo t206!!

As does the E254 Colgan's, though it is only neck and noggin. And it, unlike any of the others, has that round like the wheels on a car shape.

Just think if Colgan's, instead of being the gum that is round, was instead a larger rectangular slab of gum, perhaps the approximate size of a standard T206 card, its minty flavored corners prone to cutting tongues. Then the gum container would have been the size and shape that collectors crave, and the Colgan's Chips baseball card inserts would be this same craveable size, and the popularity of Colgan's Chips would be at a very high level, due to the set including a much larger photo of Honus as seen on his T206 card.

Brian (alternate universes for sale, discounts for larger quantities)

I prefer all 3 of these over any of the Wagner portrait “second place” cards. Though they are not “cards” they are: 1) more rare than any of the listed cards, 2) Horner image and looking left, 3) far more picturesque, 4) background game in progress, not available on any of the others listed.

If I had to choose an actual card, I’d go with the W-Unc

I’m amazed these survived their original owner or intended use and stayed in this condition for nearly 125 years.

The thing I think is most compelling about Tip Top is that it commemorates Pittsburgh’s and Wagner’s 1909 World Series victory (sorry Ty Cobb fans). In 100+ years when the world slowly forgets all about pre-war baseball (say it ain’t so Joe) this card is a time stamp and reference point of its importance to baseball.

I went with the W600. I prefer B&W photographic images over artwork renderings on cards.

No e107 love?

E107 (and W600 types I & II and M101–1 and NCP) is/are not the famous Horner photo used for the t206 pose and the question is which card with the t206 pose would you choose as a proxy

So far, I am surprised by how well the M116 pastel and Colgans are doing. They will not place in top 3 by any measure, but they are getting legit votes; I thought the shape of Colgans would keep that from getting votes and I thought the blue m116 would devour most of the votes for m116. I am also surprised by how few votes the e103 has gotten.

STOP!!
You forgot the 1906 FAN CRAZE!!!!
Thats the best B&W potrait you can get of Wagner!!!

Oh crap. I totally overlooked the Fan Craze. Good catch. I don’t know how to revise the poll. I guess bc it’s part of a game, rather intended as a collectible/to be displayed, we can say it’s not a “card” for purposes of this poll….

My vote went to the W600, but this one would be my favorite if postcards were considered. (Not mine)

Ahh my mistake. I thought it was just fav portrait

Funny, that is mine, Kevin. I did not include PCs or game cards, but I guess I could have added both. I generally agree re the Rose Co- in my opinion, it is one of the best looking issues extant

e107 by far in my opinion. Then w600 and then e103 and e90-2. Something like that.

Luke - the E107 is a great card, but it does not feature the Horner photo.

+1
I completely forgot about the RPC, would be my first choice all day long, thanks Kevin.

I'm not familiar with any of the cards so I'm wondering why the E90-2 gets so many votes and the E104-2 gets almost none. They look the same to me. Am I missing something? Why such a preference for the E90-2 over the E104-2?

Not meaning to be disrespectful - But the E 90–2 reminds me of a Simpsons card

e104-2 is much more scarce than e90-2. Hardly anyone has one! additionally i presume there are many on this forum who have the e90-2...therefore they like it the best!

The E90-2 has an attractive advertising for the American Caramel Company on the back while the E104-2 has a blank back. All things being equal, I think that most collectors prefer to have advertising on the card’s reverse as apposed to it being blank.

Thanks for the responses to my questions and the additional information about the 2 cards.

Definitely the D322 Tip Top for me. Being a marginally bigger version of the Holy Grail is hard to beat. Wagner's portrait just stands out against that color back. E104-2 would be second for me due to the extreme scarcity.

Tip Top - - 1. The color. The scarcity. The design. The fact the set was issued just for Pittsburgh in honor of the Series. There's a Barney Dreyfuss card. Just an awesome set.

W600 - - 2. Fantastic early real photo image.

That blue M116 might be my #3.

Rose PC #4.

They're all cool.